Total War: Shogun 2 is the latest installment of the long-running Total War series of turn based strategy games, and alongside Civilization V is notable for just how many units it can put on a screen at once. As it also turns out, it’s the single most punishing game in our benchmark suite (on higher end hardware at least).

With Shogun 2 the GTX 680 sees its first decisive win at last. At the all-punishing resolution of 2560 the GTX 680 not only becomes the first single-GPU card to crack 30fps, but it takes a 16% lead over the 7970 here. Even at a more practical resolution and setting of 1920 the GTX 680 still leads by 15%. Meanwhile the GTX 580 fares even worse here, with the GTX 680 leading by 51% at 2560 and a whopping 63% at 1920. Even the GTX 590 can only barely beat the GTX 680 at 2560, only to lose at 1920.

At this point we’re not sure what it is about the GTX 680 that improves on the GTX 580 by so much. Shogun 2 does use a lot of VRAM, and while the greater amount of VRAM on the GTX 680 alone wouldn’t seem to explain this, the fact that most of that memory is consumed by textures just might. We may be seeing the benefit of the much greater number of texture units GTX 680 has.

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They get to show amd "catching up" so they like it. They get to try to puke out Kepler's 2G ram and make amd's 3G shine, so they "can't resist" - and when frame rates fall below playable, "they all of a sudden" "don't care", even when the puking attempt fails. They haven't been able to resist since the 580 w 1.5G vs 2G 6950/6970 it was a great blame the low ram game for any changes. Then they checked 6950 1G 2G and 2G was slower...but so what.Now 2G Kepler has put the ram lie to rest even in triple monitor gaming... but any lesser win or loss or slimming margin can still be blamed on that, it gets people "buying the amd card" and they get real frustrated here when they can't figure out why Nvidia is winning when they don't believe it should be. It's always expressed in the article how shocked they are. So ram is a convenient scapegoat. It's always used a "future proofing" notion as well, though no evidence has ever surfaced for that.Reply

It's not about a corporation it's about facts guy. Facts mean my friends and my readers get the best they can get for the buck they are paying. Just because amd is behind and therefore lies are told, does not mean the truth should not shine through ! The truth shall shine through !Reply

Well I understand 'some' of the tech behind the GTX680 one thing stands out. 256bit bus width, when you see that with nvidia its along the lines of GTX560.... so does that mean there's going be a 384bit (mid-high) or 512bit(high-enth, 256bit + 256bit + 2 GPU) card/s coming out?

However I do not need a game that is already running at 100+ frames to be even faster.It needs to be fast at where it counts - games that are still running slow at 60 fps and below.

For this, of 3 relevant games, nVidia is faster at just one of them. Experience (if you also remember) has shown that the results could be very different once frames for some settings/games hit below 60fps.

Hence I cannot agree with all the big f about GTX680 is so much faster fuss.You guys are led by the heart (much alike ati fanboys you used to call) than the brain.

And all other compute tests are non-relevant to me (and majority of you to be honest).Reply

What about a little game (that several million people play) called Battlefield 3? NV has a massive lead with the GTX 680 over the 7970/7950. AT only benches single player, but the game is even more punishing in 64 player multiplayer. Having a smooth framerate at max detail with 4X AA/16X AF is a big competitive advantage and makes the game significantly more enjoyable.

Kind of disappointed the card isn't faster in Witcher 2, which I think has the best graphics of a single player game.Reply

Have all of you people repeating that FUD forgotten Shogun 2 Total War ?It's the hardest game in the bench set according to anandtech... How is it that THE HARDEST GAME that Nvidia swept top to bottom at every resolution is suddenly and completely forgotten about, while we hear these other FUD declarations ? How does that work, just repeat what some other mistaken fudder spewed ?Reply